Waiting for the Dawn
by hogwartshoodlum
Summary: Canon pairings. A version of Edward's POV pre-Twilight through Breaking Dawn touching on key events in his life. From pre-Forks to the final battle with the Volturi, see the Twilight saga through Edward's eyes.
1. Alaska

"Oh God, Emmett."

"You're so incredible, Rose. Hey, Edward, check out Rose's hot ass body."

Edward squinted against the sounds flooding his head from the upstairs rooms as he pounded harder on the piano to try to drown them out. He wasn't sure what was worse. That for the millionth time he had to listen through the night to the sounds of all of the worshipping couples upstairs or the fact the Emmett seemed to be proud of sharing. Most nights it was easy to ignore, he had a ton of practice blocking them out, but on nights like this...

His fingers moved steadily and quickly over the keys, seeming to play, even without his thoughts being with the music. He focused on the sheet of music in front of him, a piece that had been giving him a little trouble until tonight. He had been hoping that the harder he had to concentrate on the correct notes, the easier it would be to ignore. Unfortunately, he was a quick learner and the night was just really too long.

He was slammed with images of Jasper, one of the new members to this crazy family, as he continued to kiss each inch of Alice's naked body, and that was the last straw. Edward pounded his hands down onto the keyboard, snapping the baby grand in half as if it had been made of straw. "Damn," Edward thought as he picked up the only recognizable key from the floor and crushed it between his fingers. "Now what?"

It didn't normally do him any good to leave, especially since he was so intuned with most of his family members, even the ones that had so recently joined. Besides, typically they weren't supposed to hunt alone. For safety. From themselves as much as others. He hadn't hunted in a while, and the warm copper taste flooded his mouth again, scorching his throat and clouding his thoughts. Perhaps she would go with him. She had wanted some alone time with him, but he found himself stopped at the top of the porch stairs. She would read too much into it, he knew, but he needed something to get his mind off of other peoples thoughts.

He stepped out into the brisk winter air, trying to remember the feel of the biting wind on his cheeks as he slowly paced himself to walk across the street. It would be time to move again soon, he knew, but at least it had been a nice quiet run. They had, nearly ten years ago, moved from England where the fog proved a useful adversary to their sun problem, as well as offered Edward a few years to study at Oxford, to Alaska to be near a family that Carlisle had known that was like them. Half of the days of the year were spent in darkness, giving them the chance to live normal lives, Edward chuckled at the word normal, but the sun was coming and it was getting boring, not being around people. At least they kept life exciting. They were the only change to drive them from the dull, boring nights. He wouldn't miss Alaska. He had worried about Jasper, him being still so new, being around people, but they would be able to keep him under control. Hopefully. He had taken a break from his studies, knowing that he would have to start high school again soon. Carlise had thought it had been a long enough time that they could start their circle over again and return to a little hole in the wall off the Olympic peninsula. "Forks," Edward said out loud as if saying it would make it sound more interesting. It didn't. "Again." He had long gotten over the thought that there would be something there for him every time they moved to a new area. There never had been. It was possible that there wouldn't ever be.

He had reached the steps of the house he had been heading for and, hesitantly, knocked on the door. His hand had barely left the wood when the door flung open and she stood there, as if she had been expecting him.

"Evening, Tanya. I was wondering if you might accompany me on a hunting trip." Edward said, sounding more formal than even he normally would.

"Emmett and Rosalie at it again, are they?"

If Edward could blush he would have. "As well as the others. I just needed to get away."

Tanya seemed only too eager to follow him into the dark as she closed the door firmly behind her. The wind picked up the snow and blew it roughly in their faces, but neither reacted to the bitter change. Their clothes, unseasonable and suspicious if they were seen by any humans, billowed around them, exposing their skin to the elements. Edwards stomach matched the cold, icy slopes of the nearby cliffs. He pulled his shirt down, out of modesty and habit, and tucked it deeply into his pants.

"_God, he is so beautiful_," he heard Tanya think behind him and for a moment he had seen himself through her eyes. It was embarrassing. If she only knew him, the real him, the depressed lonely pessimist that lived within his stone facade, she wouldn't look at him that way.

He couldn't look her in the eyes as they ran, the world a blur of snow and ice as it flew by. He stopped and changed course suddenly as his nose began to pick up the scent of his prey.

"Bear? Feeling a little ambitious tonight?" Tanya asked as she picked up the scent a few steps behind him.

"I just have a lot of energy to get out," Edward said as he took his hunting crouch just feet from where the bear stood, oblivious to the coming attack.

"I can think of a better way to get out your energy," Tanya said as Edward was in mid leap, and she was able to take him off guard enough that he missed his strike, biting the bear just below the shoulder. Not a critical mistake, but not one Edward liked to make. The bear growled in pain as it turned it's gigantic paws to rip it's attacker from off it's back as Edward took another hit at the massive throbbing vein, just beneath the skin of the bears neck and drank deeply of the vital fluid that would sustain him, just as it had been doing for the bear.

He continued to drink as he heard Tanya take down the second bear that had come up behind them in one quick motion. After his thirst was quenched, although not completely diminished as it never seemed to be, he sat back to examine the damage of his moment of confusion. The Dolce and Gabbana shirt that Alice had forced him into this morning was saturated with the blood from the first wound. He was gonna be in trouble, but at least he could get back into his normal clothing, granted that she hadn't already raided his closet as she had done for Emmett.

He had obviously irritated Tanya when he had briskly returned her home, without even so much as a word of thanks. She had served her purpose, to accompany him to hunt, and with her remark in the mountains, he knew that she would only continue to try to get him to return home with her. He had no intentions, or interest, to join her for anything more tonight. He felt the need to be alone. But at least he hadn't heard Jasper or Emmett for the past hour.

He felt the rejection burning in Tanya's mind as he silently walked away, but he couldn't even feel bad. She knew his stance on their relationship. If she was feeling rejected it was because she had set herself up for it again. He wasn't interested. She just wasn't right for him. He began to wonder, as he walked the wrong direction home, if there would ever be someone that he would feel the way that he heard Emmett feel for Rosalie, Jasper for Alice, or, and he knew even if he didn't deserve it, as strong as Carlisle felt for Esme. He had seen her through his eyes, and he longed for someone to feel that way for. He knew that he wasn't exactly the best of the pick, but nearly ninety years was a long time to run into someone, and it hadn't happened.

He quickly pulled himself up a tree, careful not to break it's weak trunk as he swung from the branches, and snow fell in loud heaps from the boughs. He looked out of the barren wasteland that he had called home and realized it was the perfect metaphor for how he felt inside. With not even a soul to comfort him, he truly felt dead for the first time in years.

"Edward?" Alice's sweet, almost too sweet, voice awoke him from his self-hating session. "I know you can hear me. You're supposed to come home now. I see myself hugging you and I can't do that if you're up a tree somewhere." Her tinkling laugh annoyed him at her own private joke. Her ability could sometimes be a curse when you wanted to get lost somewhere. She could always see you, no matter where you went. He hadn't really thought about leaving again, he had gotten used to the family ties, but the thought had a least crossed his mind. "You can't leave, Edward. You have to come with us to Washington." There she went again, reading a path that he had not quiet decided on yet. Sometimes, he thought longingly for the days before Alice, to when he didn't have to know what life was bringing him, but at least it gave him reason to believe, sometimes, that good things were yet to come. Alice seemed to think that Washington was the answer to his depression, but he couldn't see how. She hadn't been to that town. True, he hadn't been there since it had changed into the town it would be now, but it never had the feel of a place of great importance.

Edward finally made his decision. Nothing good could ever come to him. He was a hollow being. Even if, by some chance, there was another vampire in Forks, which he highly doubted, he knew he couldn't care. He had a deep feeling, one that had nearly driven him crazy for the last century, that there was someone for him, only one someone, and when he did find her, he wouldn't be able to keep her. It was almost deep enough of a feeling that he decided it was time to stop torturing himself. He was going to stop looking. It was time for him to become a nomad again, live for the kill, the hunt, and nothing else.

"Edward? What the hell do you think you're doing? You are not leaving now get home NOW!" Alice's voice screamed in his head and then he was slammed with the vision that Alice had been having for months now. It was strong enough that it nearly knocked him out of the tree, a good hundred foot fall, not that he could get hurt, but he was overwhelmed by the green of the trees, the grey's of the sky, and the blue's of the ocean. It was beautiful, not at all as he remembered it, but he knew that this was where they would be living. He saw a white house, lined with huge glass windows, hidden in a thicket of trees next to a bubbling river that looked more comfortable than any other place he had called home. He saw them moving a brand new grand piano into the front room where he knew he would spend most of his nights. But the overwhelming feeling, more than anything else in the vision, was the thought that Edward wouldn't be alone on his piano bench. As he watched his hands move over the keys, to a tune he had never heard before, he saw a soft, pink hand placed over his stony white one and hold onto it. Not as Esme did when she was overwhelmed by one of his songs, but with tenderness and admiration. True deep feelings and compassion. He saw the blood flowing through the blue veins at the top of the curved slender fingers and he heard a soft steady rhythm that he knew to be a heart beat. His hands stopped playing as they reached over to grab onto the hand that had appeared, to hold it tenderly, and carefully, between his and noticed that they didn't shy from the cold that he knew must be nearly burning them. He heard the heart excellerate at his touch and realized that he wasn't the only one that had stopped breathing. He longed to look up to see the face that belonged to those hands, knowing that it would be the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, but as he looked over, the vision ended.

"Now come home, Edward," Alice said in a whispered voice. "We have to pack for Washington."

Edward jumped the hundred feet to the ground, landing with not even a soft thud, as for the first time he felt excitement fill him about his future. Maybe having Alice around wasn't that bad after all. He didn't knew if she really existed, if he would even find her in this century, but she was out there. Born yet or not, he didn't know, but he could feel her soul fill him, and for the first time ever, he felt that he may be able to be whole again. He just had to find her. As the dawn crept up on the horizon, the first glance of sun he had seen in months, Edward actually smiled. His dawn was coming. He could wait forever now. But he knew he wouldn't have to. She was coming. And he would never be lost in darkness again.


	2. Orientation

**_AN: _I was so touched by the fact that people wanted more of this story. Since being asked to continue, I have come up with a story line that I hope will please the ones that have asked. Please, please, please, review and let me know what you like and what you don't. Thanks again to AlinaLotus and 3 (of my reviewers) for your insistence that this story continue. I hope that this delivers. Thanks to all of the other readers. Please review so that I can thank you personally as well. **

**For those of you new to my writing, the italics are thoughts....just in case you were wondering. ENJOY!**

_God he's so cute._

_What are the odds that an entire family, especially adopted ones, would be that hot? Did they find an orphanage where all the models leave their unwanted babies?_

_Oh my God, check out that ass._

_He's gotta be gay. No guy looks that good. Wears that nice of clothing. God, he smells terrific._

At this thought Edward actually turned his head towards the Newton boy that sat next to him in the classroom where they awaited orientation night. He was so used to the usual thoughts when his family moved into a new town, but there was occasionally something that still stunned him. He let his mind wander to all of the others, making sure that he was not the only one having trouble being back in the mix of humans. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves, especially Emmett, although Alice's hand did appear to be very strong on Jasper's shoulder. His thoughts were calm, even if his exterior betrayed them.

_No need to worry tonight, Edward. _Alice said as she chanced a quick glance in his direction. "_He's going to be fine. Won't slip for at least a week now." _

While the thought was only slightly comforting, and Edward was just as sure that Alice was kidding about the slip, it still did not make this night any easier. They had done it so many times. In so many places. Not only was it monotonous and entirely droll, Edward was sure that if not for his cursed baby face he'd be able to be one of the mass of teachers that would eventually teach him nothing new before sliding into his perfect memory as a face of one that survived their encounter with Vampires. He hadn't ever really thought about becoming a teacher before, he preferred the ever changing world of science and medicine, but at least it would be a change. Something new.

_Why does jail-bait keep getting more and more tempting? _"What is your name son?" The overweight woman ordered from the front, much different from the sweet voice that she used for her thoughts. She must think herself quite the looker as well.

"Edward Cullen," he said with the practiced ease of a public speaker. _Why not just invite them all back home for a drink? _Edward's thoughts also betrayed his exterior. He knew that the voice that personified his thoughts was darker, more disgustingly ugly than the facade he was required to show to the world. At least he knew the real him. It seemed no one else would ever question that there was such a dark entity inside these marble walls since he would not let anyone get close enough to meet him. Besides, it seemed Alice may have fooled him again. She wasn't here. They all seemed to be the same collage of students that he'd sat with several times already.

"And what class are you in? You're age and homeroom, boy?" The woman was demanding, a blowhard, someone that demanded attention. Edward searched her mind for images of what class she was in charge of. At least she could mix up some of the malaise. Gym. And girls gym at that. Of course. Why _would_ something go right for him?

To the untrained ear, there was not a missed beat between her question and Edwards answer, but to the trained ears of his family, each of which were now staring at him from the corner of their eyes, Edward took an eternity to sort out his answer.

"I'm in..." Edward pretended to reference the schedule that he had already memorised on his desk as he straightened his thoughts back to the question at hand. How old was he supposed to be, again? He was a sophomore, according to his schedule, so that made him what, fifteen? Sixteen? They had all decided at home just how long they wanted to attempt to stay this time, but what difference did it really make? Perhaps this time around he would spice it up. Play a very ignorant twenty six that was held back and embarrass himself for amusement. It's not like it would matter, they'd all be dead in a few years and no one would remember the attractive, challenged boy from Forks High any longer then it took to laugh at him at some God-forsaken reunion that they would never be able to attend. They'd probably wonder if he had died, and they'd be mistaken. Not one of them would say, 'do you think they were Vampires that sustained themselves on the blood of the local animals?'

Edward felt a gentle nudge as Carlisle kneed him softly in the back. Edward glared up at his mentor, knowing that the pathetic drone of humans wouldn't have noticed either his delay or Carlisle's attempt to bring him around, but it still irritated him.

"...homeroom 3? Geometry. And I'm...." he envisioned his life as the twenty six year old one last time before answering. "Sixteen." He couldn't bring himself to dishonor his family, and embarrass Carlisle, but he'd be damned if he wasn't going to be allowed to drive for another year.

Edward felt Esme's hand lay softly on his solid shoulder and could tell she was worried that he was not alright. Well, he wasn't. He'd never be alright. He was a demon incarnate, they all were, even Esme with her Angelic face. Every human in the room was in danger at this very moment, as they laughed and whispered over the screams of the robotic teachers trying to explain the ways to their dens where they held nothing more than regurgitated knowledge that was so often times completely wrong. But the zombies around them would soak it all in, since it was the first time they would have to sit through it and they had no other point of reference. Their teachers knew all and would share their wisdom with the common students for forty five hellish minutes a day until they graduated and became whatever they would be when they grew up. They'd get married, have children, and those children would begin the cycle of regurgitated knowledge all over again. Edward screamed inside at the fact that he would never be on that circle. That he would have to listen to the child of the child of the awkward boy next to him give some stupid lecture on gym shower room etiquette in another Godless fifty years from now. Suddenly, Esme's hand was not the only one on his shoulder.

"Do you need to leave, son?" Carlisle murmured, too quickly for the humans around them, but Edward almost missed it as well as he tried to bring himself out of his downward spiral.

"No."

"You just seem really tense. Do you need to hunt?"

_If I'm having a bad day it must be because I'm hungry, isn't it? Vampires don't have feelings or dreams or concerns. They just float through life as perfect beings that everyone wants to be like. Well they could all have his place._

"No."

"Is it too much?" Esme's sweet voice asked.

_Yes_. "No."

"Dude?" The awkward boy from the next seat was motioning to him. Edward took the chance to lean over, involuntarily refraining from breathing even though he was sure that it wouldn't be an issue to breath any of these humans in deeply. He was well trained, Carlilse and the E.R. had seen to that, but why risk it when he was already worked up. He saw himself leaping from his chair and slaughtering the boy, not just drinking of him but ripping him apart like string cheese. He could do it. He even sort of wanted to do it. But he wouldn't. That's what the monster wanted.

"You got any gum?" Edward had to take a moment to figure out what he was even talking about before shaking his head. "Oh, sorry. I just thought I saw you chewing." He quickly turned to the girl next to him and asked the same question, this time with better results, as Edward sat back. He had two medical degrees, one from Johns Hopkins the other from Oxford, and he had now been reduced back down to 'dude'.

_Edward? Why are you tearing the children apart? Are you having issues again? _Damn Alice and her cognitive ways. He feigned a quick smile, more to reassure her that he would not act on his continuous thoughts of carnage, but she didn't return it. Perhaps his smile, which would have made any girl in the room swoon had it been directed at them, looked a bit to cynical, a bit to sadistic, when perfect eyes lay upon it.

^___^

"Well, at least everyone survived." Carlisle made an awkward attempt at humor as they all slowly, much too slowly in Edwards opinion, walked toward their new home. They thought that they would take a nice stroll, of something like twelve and half miles, and get a good idea of the layout of the town on their first night back. Carlilse wanted to time the distance to the high school and to the hospital, as well as take a look at the types of animal life that remained closer to town as opposed to closer to their home. It was a bizarre ritual, if you could call it that, since it never made any difference any way. They would always be on time, no matter how late they left, and they never hunted close to home. Their very scent warned away all of the nearby animals. It never ceased to amaze Edward how animals seemed to know that they were predators while humans, supposedly the smarter mammal by nature, never caught on until they had their teeth sunk into the tender skin of their neck.

"Oh, before I forget," Esme said, suddenly stopping and turning to face their ever growing brood. "I want your schedules. I'm starting a new scrapbook this year, since now we have two new members," she smiled sweetly at Alice and Jasper who both eagerly held out their hands. "I think I want to make it about time, and the schedules that our days revolve around. I'll want yours from work as well, dear." Edward was the last to hand over his schedule. It was just a piece of paper, as meaningless as the hours written upon it, but Esme treasured it. He would never see time the way that she did. She thought of each second with her family as a gift, something that she should treasure, while Edward saw it only as a punishment. A drop on the forehead with each tick of the hands that was slowly wearing him down. Not physically of course, nothing had changed in the last ninety years, but mentally.

"Emmett?! We've been over this before. You can not take Gym! You'll have to change it."

"Come on, mom. I'll slow up. I just want to play some sport this time around, be on the school team, and they won't let you if you don't take gym."

"It's just not possible, Em. You're too competitive and you know it. I am not going to have another Rugby incident. I'm sure that they still don't know what killed all those poor boys." Esme turned to Carlisle and Edward was sure that if tears could have been falling they would have. Emmett was so thick sometimes, but it still bothered Edward that he had such a lust for life. If truth be told it didn't bother him so much that he still had it, it was that Edward no longer did and couldn't even remember when he lost it.

"But..."

"I'm sorry, son. Perhaps this time we'll be able to play more often, as a family."

"Oh good," Emmett said in his most childish, sarcastic voice. "I haven't won against you guys enough." He stopped quickly as Esme shot him a glance, one that said he was being childish and sarcastic, and he seemed to slink to the back of the group.

They walked on silently for several more minutes, each lost in their own thoughts of their new surroundings. Alice and Rosalie occasionally broke the silence with exclamations of disgust or astonishment at the clothing of people that they passed. Obviously, Forks was a little off the arc of fashion. But none of it interested Edward, who found himself counting the rain drops as they began to fall. Rain was soothing, relaxing, comforting, but for Edward Cullen, who was finding it harder to see the good in anything, it just meant not seeing the sun.

"Wasn't that boy at the orientation?" Esme asked, and Edward didn't even have to look up. If Esme recognized someone, it wasn't just because they looked familiar. She probably knew exactly where, in a crowd of at least a hundred people, he had been sitting, what he had been wearing, who he had been talking to and what brand of shampoo he used.

"He's waving to us," Rosalie stated as if disgusted that someone so plain would associate themselves with her.

"I think he wants us to join him," Alice said as she walked forward and roughly grabbed Edward's arm.

_You don't think, you know. And you also know what he wants, probably who he's with, what they're doing._

"Is it OK if we mingle a little?" _Why do you even ask anymore? You know they'll say yes, that you'll end up dragging me along so that we can 'mingle' with what should rightfully be our dinner! _

"If you feel up to it, of course." Carlisle said. "Just be back before it looks suspicious."

"It's ten o'clock, do you know where your children are?"

"You watch too much television, Emmett."

"Mom, it was invented for people of the night. People like me. I should personally thank the inventor. But he's probably dead. Alice? Do you think they want all of us or just the ones their age? Do you think that we could get new mitts this year?"

"Do you actually listen to yourself when you talk?" Edward asked, more annoyed with his brother than he knew he should be. He usually admired him for his childlike mind, how it had become useless reading his thoughts because he always said exactly what he was thinking.

"They just want to introduce themselves before school tomorrow. It would be good to show some interest, don't you think?" Alice said as she returned the wave that was still going on. Times like this reminded Edward that they really were special, if only in some ways.

"Just don't be too memorable. We never know when we'll have to leave." They had all heard Carlisle's speech before, possibly with the exception of Alice and Jasper, and it sunk reality in a little too deeply. He didn't mean 'don't have fun,' 'don't make friends' or 'don't make a difference,' like was the rule for so many people that traveled through time in the novels that Edward had found himself addicted to. He simply meant don't do anything stupid. Don't show off. Don't kill anyone. In other words, don't do anything that would cause them to stand out. As if they had a chance at blending in.

"Will you be OK Edward?" Esme asked as Alice attempted to drag him off. Edward simply nodded, knowing that no answer was going to be good enough for both of them. Just as he began to follow after Alice, who had given up on Edward and was instead holding onto Jasper, Edward was grabbed again roughly by the shoulder.

He turned quickly and saw Carlisle's normally kind face had suddenly gone very hard. Edward attempted to follow his gaze. _You'll remember why we left in the first place, Edward. Please help your brother remember as well._

Edward nodded as he caught site of the copper skin that had just passed in front of the window of the small cafe. "They couldn't possibly know it was us. It would be an entirely different generation by now." He said quietly, so low in fact that Esme didn't even seem to hear the conversation going on just feet from her.

_Just don't give them a reason to remember. _


	3. Changing

**AN: Sorry it's been so long since I've updated. I have a lot of fics going on right now and I don't know how but this one fell in the crack. I'd love to hear some input on what you think since I'm worried that this first part will turn out too much like Midnight Sun, which was never my intention. Once I get away from Twilight I think it will be easier. **

"Hey, I'm Mike. This is Lauryn, Eric, Jessica," Mike took turns pointing out each of his friends as the Cullens entered the small, already way too crowded cafe, "um..that's Ben, Tyler and Angela." Edward took his chance to nod politely before sitting himself into a table in the corner to avoid having to make small talk until Alice said they could go.

"I'm Alice," she jumped in, almost eager at the prospect of having a few people to talk to but it was obvious already that this would be just like every other time they'd started over. Several people visibly shied away into their corners as all the Cullens' entered and some even turned their backs to begin speaking in low whispers that they didn't realize were still being overheard. Alice, on the other hand, didn't seem to mind that people were now visibly ignoring her as she introduced the rest of the family and gave them the usual run down on the family's "history".

Edward took this chance to focus on the other group of teenagers that had not been introduced as friends of Mr. Newton. Three young girls, perhaps around seventeen themselves, sat laughing as they managed to finish off a banana split between the three of them while two other boys sat ogling the three girls as they licked chocolate syrup from off of their fingers. It was obvious that they were all together, more of a family than friends it seemed, but Edward was not interested in seeing what relations they held as much as he was worried about recognition of the Cullen's "condition" which had no doubt been passed down from their families. However, their minds seemed to be on the normal teenage worries and even as the youngest looking of the girls turned to look over the new comers, her only thoughts were on Emmetts' jeans.

"Disgusting," Edward said as he turned his thoughts back into his own and waited for Alice to give up the charade.

"You're Edward, right?" a young girl's voice asked as the seat next to him was suddenly taken. Edward nodded as he swallowed the hunger rising in his throat. He had hunted just the day before, but suddenly the room was too crowded and too cramped and the acid began to rise. A quick glance at Jasper told him that this visit may just be shorter than Alice hoped for as he closed his eyes against the pain.

"I'm Jessica, by the way," the young girl continued, even putting her hand out to try and shake it in the typical introduction but Edward just checked his watch. "So, you haven't been here long, have you."

"Obviously not," Edward said, allowing his boredom to filter through his words as he unnecessarily changed positions to increase his look of discomfort.

"Oh, well," the girl continued, obviously not taking a single one of his hints, "if you need someone to show you around, you know like a tour guide or something..."

_I wouldn't trust you to help me find my way out of a paper sack, _Edward thought as he looked at the girl desperately try to turn up the charm by readjusting the plunge of her shirt.

"There's not that much to really see around here." Edward said as he glanced once towards her and then looked towards his family again as he noticed that, like always, they had found themselves on the outskirts of the crowd. Alice sat, her head buried in Jasper's shoulder as he tried to keep her spirits high.

_I just thought this time would be different is all, _Alice thought towards Edward as she peeked over at him. He couldn't help but feel bad at her heartbreaking expression but didn't see how she could have thought that people would ever change. His thoughts wandered around the room as he processed through the typical thoughts of awkwardness and fear. Most people looked at them with desire, as they were supposed to, but most still recognized the threat and began the thoughts of "freaks" and "weirdo's" that Edward knew were only just beginning.

Just as Edward once again turned off the thoughts of the people around them he was slammed from the back by a young boy that had just entered the cafe. Edward had barely rocked forward as the young boy turned to rub his shoulder from the impact, obviously thinking that he must have hurt the man he hit as well.

"Whoa, sorry dude."

"You should watch were you're going," Jessica added as if she felt the need to stand up for her new "boy-toy", or so her thoughts believed.

"I really am sorry," the young boy stated as he continued to rub his shoulder.

"Jacob!" One of the older girls from the table stated as she flung her raven hair over her shoulder. "We told you you _couldn't_ hang out with us."

"What are you doing here?" said the other girl, who actually looked as if she could be the twin of the girl next to her now that Edward looked at her properly.

"Dad sent me. He wants you back. Says it's a school night." The young boy walked forward and took a handful of fries from his sisters plate as she slapped the back of his head.

The siblings continued to fight as for the first time Edward looked back towards the back window where the first girl he had noticed was now sitting on the lap of the oldest looking boy and running a finger through his long hair.

"You OK, Sammie?" she whispered into his ear as she layed a soft kiss on his sweating brow.

"I don't know. I just suddenly feel kind of, I don't know," he was obviously feeling ill as he lay his head back against the cool window. The girl rose and pulled on his hand.

"Come on baby, I'm gonna get you home," the girl had trouble getting him to stand as he seemed to be weaving on his feet.

"Oh, Leah, you're not leaving now are you?" one of the sisters asked as they once again pushed away their little brother.

"I think Sam's getting sick. I'm gonna take him home."

"Yeah, and dad's gonna have your ass if you don't get home," Jacob said through a mouthful of fries as both girls rolled their eyes and shoved past him as they picked up their jackets. "You've gotta give me a ride."

"You walked here, you can walk back," one of the girls remarked as she passed Edward and gave him a once over as she smiled.

"Aw, come on Rachel. I'm not walking back just because you're trying to show off for your friends."

"No, you're walking back because your a whiny little, daddy's ass kissing twerp," the other sister apparently agreed as she nodded and shoved him out of the door.

It was at this time that Edward realized that Jessica had been talking this entire time, apparently believing that she still had a chance as long as she played herself up.

"Alice," Edward said as he abruptly stood up, leaving Jessica completely confused at his sudden absence, "you ready?"

Alice nodded as Edward offered her his hand and pulled her into a brotherly hug. "It's not you, sweet heart. It's just the way it is." Edward passed Alice off into Jasper's waiting arms and heard the typical thoughts

_I thought they were brother and sister._

_What the hell? Is sodomy allowed in Alaska?_

that normally followed his family's display of public affection. Emmett seemed to know exactly what people were thinking as he quickly grabbed Rose's ass as the Cullens turned to walk back into the night where, ironically, they did belong.

"Well that was entertaining," Rosalie said, the sarcasm running over her lips faster than her words.

"Shut up, Rosalie," Edward said as he attempted a half smile at Alice before walking quickly in front of his family.

"Don't tell me to shut up," Rosalie stated as she quickened her pace to match his. "That was a joke." As she finally got in front of him she stopped, placing her hands on his chest to stop him in his tracks.

"This whole thing is a joke and if it wasn't for you we could still be in Alaska instead of hillbilly town USA trying to fit in with humans." The last word of her sentence might just have been the ugliest word in the English language.

"Did you even think about the rest of us before deciding that you couldn't put up with Tanya? Why are you always so selfish, Edward?"

"Perhaps I learned from the best," Edward retorted as he pushed her hands from his chest roughly before turning towards the woods they were walking along.

"Come on, Edward, don't do this," he briefly heard Emmett say before he took off into the dense trees, running as if the devil himself was chasing him.

_God he's such a baby, _Edward heard Rosalie say as she watched him run away, thinking that he was running simply because of what she had said. It wasn't exactly true but it didn't seem worth trying to explain anything to Rosalie. She was an all knowing Goddess that didn't need explanations and wouldn't listen or understand them if he tried. It was always going to be his fault, or Emmett's, or Alice's. Never Rosalie. She thought that moving was something that he had chosen, something that he knew would make him happy. The truth was that even with Alice's vision, he was certain that there was nothing here for him just like there was nothing for him in Alaska and he was beginning to think there was nothing for him in this world. Worse than there being nothing was the knowledge that there was no escape for him.

He slowed, knowing he could run as far as the other coast and not lose the demons on his heels and it was then that he heard the footfalls behind him. Much too light to be human, much to heavy to be vampire.

"Go away, Emmett." Edward said without even turning around. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Dude, what makes you think I do?" Emmett appeared at his side, a goofy grin plastered on his face as he slugged the back of Edwards shoulder sending him teetering forward. "You think that you're the only one that has to get away every now and then?"

They walked in silence, with no real destination in mind for several minutes. Well, Edward walked in silence, while Emmett whistled, counted lizards and stopped long enough to climb an oak before jumping from it's top branch.

"So," Emmett began and Edward sighed in exasperation. "She didn't mean what she said man. She's just..."

"Being herself," Edward finished hoping that would end the conversation. Emmett didn't seem to hear the period Edward had put on the end of this topic.

"Yeah, she does speak her mind, you know that. What I mean is that she didn't mean that this was your fault," Emmett continued until Edward stopped, his head cocked at a distant sound that Emmett had obviously not heard.

"I mean, it is sort of your fault, but it's not like we could have stayed in Alaska forever. I mean we could have but..."

"Shut up," Edward said, catching a scent that had sent his attack mode into overdrive.

"Come on Edward, stop being so Emo man. You're really not that complicated."

Edward turned, his eyebrows knitted at how unobservant Emmett could be as somewhere not a hundred feet from them a branch snapped. But as if to prove his point, Emmett took his look the wrong way.

"Really man. I hate to be the one to break it to you that you bring a lot of your 'lonliness' on yourself. That girl at the cafe would have let you have her. She probably wouldn't even make you remember her name after."

Now Edwards mouth dropped open at the crudeness that shouldn't have continually shocked him but he didn't have time to get into that right now. Just as he closed his mouth and took a step in front of his brother who had finally seemed to catch on to the scent, a man emerged from the trees, a look of murder across his copper face.


End file.
